This isn't a class that's being asked to replace to an entire roster like Lavin was forced to. There was no need to take the chances that the staff took.
What are you talking about? Lavin inherited a tournament team with ten seniors that went on to play professional basketball. Mullin inherited Felix Balamou and Amir Alibagoshit and within two recruiting cycles has assembled more talent than that nice person Lavin did in five years. What are you even talking about? Good grief.
That's not entirely fair. The idea that he inherited an NCAA team is based on the fact he took them to the NCAA's not because he inherited a team that played in one prior. That is a huge difference. Mike Jarvis inherited an NCAA team from Fran, why? Because they went to the NCAA's the year before and returned Artest, Postell, Ty Grant, Bootsy (who would become eligible) and the top HS PG in the country coming in. 10 seniors or not he inherited a team that went 5-13, 6-12 and 6-12 in the BE in the 3 years prior to his arrival, hardly evidence he inherited an NCAA team.
Furthermore even if you grant the fact that he "inherited an NCAA team" by definition he had to essentially replace an entire roster, you can't blame that on him. In other words you can't have it both ways, you can't say he inherited all those seniors and then dismiss the fact that he had to replace an entire roster that he inherited.
Furthermore by his 3rd year he had a 8-10 NIT team in a much more difficult conference (cannot compare the current BE to the old BE. Not even close). By his 4th year he had arguably the most talented roster at SJU in a long time even without Harkless. With Harkless it would have been right there with Villanova in the BE imho. This is where you can argue he underachieved and did not do enough. Because that is where I would agree. But either way 3 20 win seasons and 4 NIT/NCAA seasons in 5 years is not good enough. That is fine. It shouldn't be, we expect to be at a level commensurate with Nova. No reason they can't.
But Mullin did not inherit a mess of a program. He needed to rebuild the roster no doubt. But he is going into his 3rd year, he has forced out a well known assistant, had countless kids transfer, whiffed on most of the top local kids (a huge factor in his hiring was going to be him and his staff's ability to land Alkins, Tucker, Naz Reid, Muhammad etc). Because again although he deserves credit for rebuilding the roster at the same time he has gotten far too much credit from posters giving him credit for improving from 1 league win to 7. When you are THAT BAD early it is virtually IMPOSSIBLE not to improve unless you are named Rutgers. Bottom line is if Lavin were the coach the last 2 years I don't think SJU would have been much worse or in fact worse, my guess is they would have been better specifically 2015-16 (Mullin's first year because I think Lavin would have had some recruits stay-I don't fault Mullin for that however).
The harder part is NOW. SJU squeezed every possible win out of last year they could. Most of their losses were blowouts especially in the league. That is what scares me. The record can be misleading I look at not just the losses but how competitive they were in those losses as evidence they have it going in the right direction. The losses were blowouts for the most part, totally non-competitive. The easy part was going from 1 to 7, the harder part is going from 7 to 10 or 11 and beyond. He needs to start showing NOW why he and not Lavin not Danny Hurley was the best choice for SJU 2 1/2 years ago. He needs to start showing this year he can do that and then put in the work on the road to capitalize with recruits.